II. THE SPRING.
The purgatory pass'd—the stalactitesThat fring'd the cliffs fell crashing to the earth;With clamor shrill the wild geese skimm'd the heights,In airy navies sailing to the north;The bluebirds chirrup'd in the naked woods,The water-willows donn'd their downy blooms,The trim swamp-maple blush'd with ruddy buds,The forest-ash hung out its sable plumes.
The shad-bush gleam'd a wreath of purest snow,The white stars of the bloodroot peep'd from foldsOf rotting leaves, and in the meadows lowShone saffron spots, the gay marsh-marigolds.May made all green, and on the fifth of JuneA sail appeared, with succor none too soon.
IDLENESS.
The street was brisk, an animated scene,And every man was on some business bent,Absorbed in some employment or intent,Pre-occupied, intelligent and keen.True, some were dwarf'd and some were pale and lean.But to the sorriest visage Labor lentA light, transfiguring with her sacramentThe abject countenance and slavish mien.
But one—he shambled aimlessly alongAsham'd, and shrunk from the abstracted kenOf passers-by with conscience-struck recoil,A pariah, a leper in the throng,An alien from the commonwealth of men,A stranger to the covenant of toil.
SUCCESS.
What is success? In mad soul-suicideThe world's vain spoils rapaciously to seize,To pamper the base appetite of pride,And live a lord in luxury and ease?Is this success, whereof so many prate?—To have the Midas-touch that turns to goldEarth's common blessings? to accumulate,And in accumulation to grow old?
Nay, but to see and undertake with zestThe good most in agreement with our powers,To strive, if need be, for the second best,But still to strive, and glean the golden hours,With eyes for nature, and a mind for truth,And the brave, loving, joyous heart of youth.
THE EXCLUSION OF ASIATICS.
Is our renown'd Dominion then so smallAs not to hold this new inhabitant?Or are her means so pitiably scantAs not to yield a livelihood to all?Or are we lesser men, foredoom'd to thrall?Or so much better than the immigrantThat we should make our hearts as adamantAnd guard against defilement with a wall?
Nay, but our land is large and rich enoughFor us and ours and millions more—her needIs working men; she cries to let them in.Nor can we fear; our race is not the stuffServants are made of, but a royal seed,And Christian, owning all mankind as kin.
THE PEOPLE'S RESPONSE TO HEROISM.
Our hearts are set on pleasure and on gain.Fine clothes, fair houses, more and daintier bread;We have no strivings, and no hunger-painFor spiritual food; our souls are dead.So judged I till the day when news was rifeOf fire besieging scholars and their dames,And bravely one gave up her own fair lifeIn saving the most helpless from the flames.
Then when I heard the instantaneous cheerThat broke with sobbing undertones from allThe multitude, and watched them drawing near,Stricken and mute, around her funeral pallIn grief and exultation, I confestMy judgment erred,—we know and love the best.
AN ARISTOCRAT.
Her fair companions she outshone,As this or that transcendent starMakes all its sister orbs look wanAnd dim and lustreless and far.
Her charm impressed the fleeting glance,But chiefly the reflective mind;A century's inheritance,By carefull'st nurture still refined.
Devotions, manners, hopes that were,Ideals high, traditions fine,Were felt to culminate in her,The efflorescence of her line.
What time and cost conspired to traceHer lineaments of perfect grace!
IN WAREHOUSE AND OFFICE.
How can the man whose uneventful days,Each like the other, are obscurely spentAmid the mill's dead products, keep his gazeUpon a lofty goal serenely bent?Or he who sedulously tells and groupsTheir minted shadows with deft finger-tips?Or who above the shadow's shadow stoops,And dips his pen and writes, and writes and dips?
How can he? Yet some such have been and are,Prophets and seers in deed, if not in word,And poets of a faery land afar,By incommunicable music stirred;Feasting the soul apart with what it craves,Their occupation's masters, not its slaves.
H. M. S. "DREADNOUGHT."
Titanic craft of many thousand tons,A smaller Britain free to come and go,Relying on thy ten terrific gunsTo daunt afar the most presumptuous foe;Thick-panoplied with plates of hardened steel,Equipped with all the engin'ry of death,Unrivalled swiftness in thy massive keel,Annihilation latent in thy breath.
"Dreadnought" thy name. And yet, for all thy sizeAnd strength, the ocean might engulf thy prow,Or the swift red torpedo of the skies,The lightning, blast thy boast-emblazoned brow;Thou hast thy use, but Britain's sons were wiseTo put their trust in better things than thou.
THE REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA.
From Lapland to the land of Tamerlane,Kamchatka to the confines of the Turk,The spirit tyrants never can restrainWhen once awake is mightily at work.Liberty, frantic with a fearful hope,Out of long darkness suddenly arisen,Maddens the dull half-human herds who gropeAnd rend the bars of their ancestral prison.
Over the wan lone steppe her couriers speed,The secret forest echoes her command,She smites the sword that made her children bleed,And Death and Havoc hold the famished land.But God overrules, and oft man's greatest goodIs won through nights of dread and days of blood.
TEA'S APOLOGIA.
Loved by a host from Noah's days till now,Extolled by bards in many a glowing line,My purple rival of the mantling browMay laugh to scorn this swarthy face of mine.I care not: many a weary pain I cure;Cold, heat and thirst I harmlessly abate;I bless the weak, the aged and the poor;And I have known the favor of the great.
I've cheered the minds of mighty poets gone;Philosophers have owned my solace true;Shy Cowper was my sweet Anacreon;Keen Hazlitt craved "whole goblets" of my brew;De Quincey praised my stimulating draught;What cups of me old Doctor Johnson quaffed!
A WISH.
When my time comes to quit this pleasing scene,And drop from out the busy life of men;When I shall cease to be where I have beenSo willingly, and ne'er may be again;When my abandoned tabernacle's dustWith dust is laid, and I am counted dead;Ere I am quite forgotten, as I mustBe in a little while, let this be said:
He loved this good God's world, the night and day,Men, women, children (these he loved the best);Pictures and books he loved, and work and play,Music and silence, soberness and jest;His mind was open, and his heart was gay;Green be his grave, and peaceful be his rest!
ALONE WITH NATURE.
The rain came suddenly, and to the shoreI paddled, and took refuge in the wood,And, leaning on my paddle, there I stoodIn mild contentment watching the downpour,Feeling as oft I have felt heretofore,Rooted in nature, that supremest moodWhen all the strength, the peace, of solitude,Sink into and pervade the being's core.
And I have thought, if man could but abateHis need of human fellowship, and findHimself through Nature, healing with her balmThe world's sharp wounds, and growing in her state,What might and greatness, majesty of mind,Sublimity of soul and Godlike calm!
THE WORKS OF MAN AND OF NATURE.
Man's works grow stale to man: the years destroyThe charm they once possessed; the city tires;The terraces, the domes, the dazzling spiresAre in the main but an attractive toy—They please the man not as they pleased the boy;And he returns to Nature, and requiresTo warm his soul at her old altar fires,To drink from her perpetual fount of joy.
It is that man and all the works of manPrepare to pass away; he may dependOn naught but what he found her stores among;But she, she changes not, nor ever can;He knows she will be faithful to the end,For ever beautiful, for ever young.
A DAY REDEEMED.
I rose, and idly sauntered to the pane,And on the March-bleak mountain bent my look;And standing there a sad review I tookOf what the day had brought me. What the gainTo Wisdom's store? What holds had Knowledge ta'en?I mused upon the lightly-handled book,The erring thought, and felt a stern rebuke:"Alas, alas! the day hath been in vain!"
But as I gazed upon the upper blue,With many a twining jasper ridge up-ploughed,Sudden, up-soaring, swung upon my viewA molten, rolling, sunset-laden cloud:My spirit stood, and caught its glorious hue—"Not lost the day!" it, leaping, cried aloud.
OUTREMONT.
Far stretched the landscape, fair, without a flaw,Down to one silver sheet, some stream or cloud,Through glamorous mists. Midway, an engine ploughedAcross the scene. In meditative aweI stood and gazed, absorbed in what I saw,Till sweet-breathed Evening came, the pensive-browed,And creeping from the city, spread her shroudOver the sunlit slopes of Outremont.
Soon the mild Indian summer will be past,November's mists soon flee December's snows;The trees may perish, and the winter's blastWreck the tall windmills; these weak eyes may close;But ever will that scene continue fastFixed in my soul, where richer still it grows.
THE NEW OLD STORY.
Hard by an ancient mansion stood an oak;For centuries, 'twas said, it had been there:The old towers crumbled 'neath decay's slow stroke,While, hall by hall, upgrew a palace fair;Lives and momentous eras waxed and waned,Old barons died, and barons young and gayRuled in their stead, and still the oak remained,And each new spring seemed older not a day.
The vesture of the spirit of mankind,—Forms and beliefs, like meteors, rise and set;The spirit too doth change; but o'er the mindThis old Evangel holds young lordship yet;And here among Canadian snows we bringEach Christmastide our tribute to the King.
RECREATION.
Give me a cottage embower'd in trees,Far from the press and the din of the town;There let me loiter and live at my ease,Happier far than the King with his crown.
There let the music that's sweeter than wordsWaken my soul's inarticulate song,Murmur of zephyrs and warbling of birds,Babble of waters that hurry along.
Under the shade of the maple and beechLet me in tranquil contentment recline,Learning what nature and solitude teach,Charming philosophy, human, divine;
Finding how trivial the myriad thingsLife is concern'd with, to seek or to shun;Seeing the sources whence blessedness springs,Gathering strength for the work to be done.
PAESTUM.
Paestum, your temples and your streetsHave been restored to view;Your fadeless Grecian beauty greetsThe eyes of men anew.
But where are all your roses now—Those wonderful delightsThat made such garlands for the browOf your fair Sybarites?
They in your time were more renown'd,And dearer to your heart,Than these fine works which mark the boundAnd highest reach of art.
We'd see you as you look'd of old;Though column, arch and wallWere worth a kingdom to behold,One rose would shame them all.
RONDEAU: AN APRIL DAY.
An April day, when skies are blue,And earth rejoices to renewHer vernal youth by lawn and lea,And sap mounts upward in the tree,And ruddy buds come bursting through;
When violets of tender hueAnd trilliums keep the morning dewThrough all the sweet forenoon—give meAn April day;
When surly Winter's roystering crewHave said the last of their adieux,And left the fettered river free,And buoyant hope and ecstasyOf life awake, my wants are few—An April day.
AUTUMN.
The Year, an aged holy priest,In gorgeous vestments clad,Now celebrates the solemn feastOf Autumn, sweet and sad.
The Sun, a contrite thuriferAfter his garish days,Through lessening arch, a wavy blur,His burnish'd censer sways.
The Earth,—an altar all afireHer hecatombs to claim,Shoots upward many a golden spireAnd crimson tongue of flame.
Like Jethro's shepherd, when he turn'dIn Midian's land to viewThe bush that unconsuming burn'd,I pause—and worship, too.
MY TWO BOYS.
To some the heavenly Father goodHas given raiment rich and fine,And tables spread with dainty food,And jewels rare that brightly shine.
To some He's given gold that buysImmunity from petty care,Freedom and leisure and the prizeOf pleasing books and pictures fair.
To some He's given wide domainsAnd high estate and tranquil ease,And homes where all refinement reignsAnd everything combines to please.
To some He's given minds to knowThe what and how, the where and when;To some, a genius that can throwA light upon the hearts of men.
To some He's given fortunes freeFrom sorrows and replete with joys;To some, a thousand friends; to meHe's given my two little boys.
MY OLD CLASSICAL MASTER.
Ever hail'd with delight when my memory straysO'er the various scenes of my juvenile days,Do you mind if I sing a poor song in your praise,My jolly old classical master?
You were kind—over-lenient, 'twas rumor'd, to rule—And so learn'd, though the blithest of all in the school,'Twas your pupil's own fault if he left you a fool,My jolly old classical master.
"Polumetis Odusseus" you brought back to life,"Xanthos Menelaos" recalled to the strife:You knew more about Homer than Homer's own wife,My jolly old classical master.
You could sever each classical Gordian knot,Each "crux criticorum" explain on the spot;We preferr'd your opinion to Liddell and Scott,My jolly old classical master.
To you "Arma virumque," "All Gaul" and the restWere a snap of the fingers, a plaything, a jest,Even Horace mere English—you lik'd Horace best,My jolly old classical master.
We esteemed you a marvel in Latin and Greek,An Erasmus, a Bentley, a Person, a freak;And for all sorts of knowledge we held you unique,My jolly old classical master.
You brought forth from your treasury things new and old,Philosophical gems, oratorical gold;And how many a capital story you told,My jolly old classical master!
Your devotion to learning, whole-hearted and pure,Your fine critical relish of literature,And your gay disposition, had charms to allure,My jolly old classical master.
Here's a health to you, sir, from a thousand old boys,Who once plagu'd you with nonsense and tried you with noise,But who learn'd from you, lov'd you, and wish you all joys,My jolly old classical master.
May your mien be still jovial, your mind be still bright,May your wit be still sprightly, your heart be still light,And long, long may it be ere your spirit takes flight,My jolly old classical master.
THE GOLD-MINERS OF BRITISH COLUMBIA.
They come not from the sunny, sunny south,Nor from the Arctic region,Nor from the east, the busy, busy east,The where man's name is legion;But they come from the west, the rugged, rugged west,From the world's remotest edges;And their pockets they are filled with the yellow, yellow goldThat they mined in the mountain ledges.
CHORUS—
Then, hey, lads, hey, for the mining man so bold,Who comes from the world's far edges!And hey for the gold, the yellow, yellow gold,That is stored in the mountain ledges!
They basked not, they, in balmy tropic shade,'Neath orange tree and banyan;But braved the bush, the torrent and the steep,By gorge and gulch and canyon.They would not be held back in cities over desks,Or among the homestead hedges;So their pockets now are filled with the yellow, yellow goldThat they mined in the mountain ledges.
They left their homes, their loved ones all behind,Forsook kind friend and neighbor,And went to seek the thing of greatest worth,For gold, rare gold, to labor.Oh! they bled the old earth—they opened up her veinsWith their picks and drills and sledges;And their pockets now are filled with the yellow, yellow goldThat they mined in the mountain ledges.
WAR-SHIPS IN PORT.
The tread of armèd mariners is in our streets to-day,An Empire's pulse is beating in the march of this array.From western woods, and Celtic hills, and homely Saxon shires,They sailed beneath the "meteor flag," the emblem of our sires;And for the glory that has been, the pride that yet may be,We hail them in the sacred names of home and liberty,And know that not on sea or land more dauntless hearts there areThan the hearts of these bold seamen from the English men-of-war.
Trafalgar's fame-crowned hero stands, encarved in storied stone,And from his place of honor looks in silence and alone:But no, to-day his spirit lives, and walks the crowded way;For us Drake, Hawkins, Frobisher and Howard live to-day;For us from many a page of eld, 'mid war and tempest blast,A thousand thousand valiant forms come trooping from the past,And say, "Forget not us to-day, we have a part with these,The 'sea-dogs' of old England, the 'Mistress of the Seas.'"
No, no, ye gruff old heroes, ye can never be forgot;The memory of your prowess will outlive the storm, the shotDestruction pours impartially on common and sublime,And scorn the volleying years that mount the battery of time;For far above this tide of war your worth is written clearOn fame's bright rock of adamant, imperishable here;Your names may be recorded not, your graves be 'neath the keel,But many a million English hearts some love for you shall feel.
Five grim old ocean-buffeters, stern ploughshares of the deep,Have come to visit us of those whose duty 'tis to keep,With the old lion's courage and the young eagle's ken,Their sleepless watch upon the sea that skirts this world of men:And if again in stately pride their lordly forms they bearUpon the ample bosom of our noble stream, whene'erFrom massive prow impregnable their peaceful anchor falls,We'll hail old England's hearts of steel who man her iron walls.
ON FINDING A COPY OF BURNS'S POEMS INTHE HOUSE OF AN ONTARIO FARMER.
Large Book, with heavy covers worn and old,Bearing clear proof of usage and of years,Thine edges yellow with their faded gold,Thy leaves with fingers stained—perchance with tears;
How oft thy venerable page has feltThe hardened hands of honorable toil!How oft thy simple song had power to meltThe hearts of the rude tillers of the soil!
How oft has fancy borne them back to seeThe Scottish peasant at his work, and thouHast made them feel the grandeur of the freeAnd independent follower of the plough!
What careth he that his proud name hath peal'dFrom shore to shore since his new race began,In humble cot and "histie stibble field"Who doth "preserve the dignity of man"?
With reverent hands I lay aside the tome,And to my longing heart content returns,And in the stranger's house I am at home,For thou dost make us brothers, Robert Burns.
And thou, old Book, go down from sire to son;Repeat the pathos of the poet's life;Sing the sweet song of him who fought and wonThe outward struggle and the inward strife.
Go down, grand Book, from hoary sire to son;Keep by the Book of books thy wonted place;Tell what a son of man hath felt and done,And make of us and ours a noble race,—
A race to scorn the sordid greed of gold,To spurn the spurious and contemn the base,Despise the shams that may be bought and sold,—A race of brothers and of men,—a race
To usher in the long-expected timeGood men have sought and prophets have foretold,When this bright world shall be the happy climeOf brotherhood and peace, when men shall mould
Their lives like His who walked in Palestine;The truly human manhood thou dost show,Leading them upward to the pure divineNature of God made manifest below.
THE IDEAL PREACHER.
It was back in Renfrew County, near the Opeongo line,Where the land's all hills and hollows and the hills are clothedwith pine,And in the wooded valleys little lakes shine here and thereLike jewels in the masses of a lovely woman's hair;Where the York branch, by a channel ripped through rugged rocksand sand,Sweeps to join the Madawaska, speeding downward to the Grand;Where the landscape glows with beauty, like a halo shed abroad,And the face of nature mirrors back the unseen face of God.
I was weary with my journey, and with difficulty stroveTo keep myself awake at first, as, sitting by the stoveIn old William Rankin's shanty, I attended as I mightTo the pioneer backwoodsman's tales far on into the night;But William talked until the need of sleep one quite forgot,Not stopping but to stir the fire, which kept the stove red-hot;For the wind was raw and cold without, although the month of May:Up north the winter struggles hard before it yields its sway;And the snow is in the forests, and the ice is in the lakes,And the frost is in the seedland oft when sunny June awakes.
He talked of camps in winter time, of river drives in spring,Of discords in the settlement,—in fact, of everything;He told of one good elder who'd been eaten by a bear,And wondered that a beast of prey should eat a man of pray'r;Of beast, from wolf to porcupine, killed with gun, axe and fork,And, finally, of college men who did not pine for pork."But yet among them students," said the bushman, "there wuz oneAs hit me an' the settlement as fair as any gun.
"O' course, he wa'nt no buster, hed no shinin' gifts o' speech;But jis' as reg'lar he could give some pointers how to preach.He talked straight on like tellin' yarns—more heart, I'd say, 'an head;But somehow people felt he meant 'bout every word he said.He wa'n't chuck full o' larnin' from the peelin' to the core;—Leastwise, he wa'n't the kind they call a college batch-o'-lore;He'd no degree, the schoolma'am said,—though soon he let 'em seeThat o' certain sterlin' qualities he had a great degree,—Leastwise he hed no letters till the hind end o' his name,—But, preacher, say, you don't set much importance by them same?—Y' may hev titles o' y'r own, an' think I'm speakin' bold;But there's that bob-tailed nag o' mine, the chestnut three-year-old;It's true she can't make such a swish, to scare away the flies,But if y'd see her cover ground, y'd scarce believe y'r eyes.
"O' course, he hed his enemies,—you preachers alluz hez,—But 'twa'n't no use their tellin' us he wa'n't the stuff, I gez;An' after while they closed right up an' looked like,—it wuz fun,—When they seed the way he 'sisted out ol' Game-leg Templeton.O' course, y' knows ol' Templeton,—twuz him as druv y' in;Y' noticed, maybe, how he limped, and sort o' saved his shin.He's run the mail through fair and foul 'tween this and Cumbermere,And faithful served Her Majesty fur nigh on twenty year.
"The preacher stayed with Templeton, the same's you're stay'n' with me,On a new clearance back o' this, which, course, y' didn't see.An' one day on a visit tour the chap wuz startin' outIn the way o' Little Carlow,—twuz good twelve mile round about,—An' in the bush he'd lose hisself, as everybody knowed:'I'll take the axe,' says Templeton, 'an' go an' blaze a road.It's only three mile through the bush.' An' so they started in,Quite happy like,—men never knows when troubles will begin.'Bout noon,—the folks was in the house a eatin' o' their snack,—The chap comes home with Templeton a-hangin' on his back.
"The call wuz close fur Templeton, who'd somehow missed his stroke;He alluz swung a heavy blow, an' the bone wuz well-nigh broke;An' wust of all, 'twuz two whole days afore the doctor came;He was up the Long Lake section, seein'—what's that fellow's name?—Well, never mind.—An' when he did examine of the wound,He said 'twould take all summer fur the man to git around.
"Well, what y' think thet preacher done, but turn right out an' mowThe meadow down an' put it in, and th' harvest, too, althoughThe ol' man worried and complained as how he'd orter stop;An' there wa'nt no binders in them days, and work wuz work, sure pop.
"Well, when the people heerd about the way that preacher done,All on 'em growed religious straight, sir, every mother's son;The meetin'-house wuz crowded from the pulpit to the door—Some on 'em hadn't showed face there fur twenty year or more;An' them as sot out on the fence an' gossiped all the while,Jis' brought the fence planks in and sot down on 'em in the aisle,An' listened,—sir, no orator as ever spoke aloudWorked on his audience the way as that chap on our crowd.
We aint no shakes o' people; we aint up to nothin' new;But we knows a man what's shammin' and we knows a man what's true.An' when we heerd that preacher talk 'bout Christian sacrificeAnd bearin' burdens for the weak, we valued his advice;An' we showed it—there wuz nothin' as we thought too good for him;We poured our cup o' gratitude an' filled it to the brim.
"He aint been near so fort'nate 'n the city where he's went;Some folks as didn't like him set them sticklers on his scent;An' the presbytery giv him fits fur trimmin' of his lampThe way it shined the brightest, an' he jined another camp.But most men,—leastwise such as him,—I take it, fur my part,Aint got much devil in their brains when God is in their heart;An' I'll allow it yet, although they puts me in the stocks,That religion what is practical's sufficient orthodox.
"Well, thet's the finest preacher as hez struck back here to spout,An' there never wuz another we cared very much about.I've heerd o' Beecher's meetings an' such men as John B. Gough;But fourteen waggon loads druv down to see that preacher off.We sent him back to college with a fresh supply o' socks,—Nigh everything a student needs wuz jammed intill that box;An', preacher, spite of what yourself with all your parts may feel,Fur me an' Game-leg Templeton that man is our ideel."
THE WHEEL OF MISFORTUNE.
O m'sieu, doan you hask me ma story, doan hask me how dis was happenn;Dat's one beeg black hole on ma life, w'ere I doan want to look on some more....Well, he's coom joos' so well for to tole you, all tak' beet tabac firs' and denA'll tole you what cep' to de pries' a have nevare tole no one before.
Bien, M'sieu; he's come pass joos like dis way; a go out wit' de boys to make lark;Dare was Armand and Joseph and Louiee, an' we drink on de deefront saloon.An' we feenish in plac' wit' de music, like one of dose garden or park,W'ere he's play dose curse wheel for de monee—in Hingleesh dat's wheel of fortune.
He was Saturday night on de week, M'sieu, an' a have ma week's pay on my bourse,Wit'out w'at we pay for de whiskey—'bout one dollar feefty or less;An' a'm t'ink a can win me lots monee, and eef a doan win some, of coorse,A can stop 'fore a lose much, a tell me, but a've pooty beeg hope for success.
Well, Louiee, he's be careful, risk notting, he's laugh w'en a'm buy some paddell,Armand he's buy some for obligement, he's not half so careful's Louiee.An' we play dare teel half pas' eleven, an' de meantime she's go pooty well,Teel Armand he's lose all she's monee, an' shortly 's de same ting wit' me.
But Louiee he's got plaintee of monee, an' he's got plaintee fr'en' on de plac',An' a'm hask heem for lend me ten dollar, a'm pay wit' good interes', be sure;He'll tol me he's got more as feefty an' he's give me plusieurs jours de grace,For Louiee he was know a was hones' for all a was poor of de poor.
Well, I not was require all dat monee teel de wheel she was tak' few more whirl,For a keep on to lose pooty steady, and Armand he say, "Doan play< some more,"But Louiee he say, "Win yet posseeble," and Joseph he was off wit' his girl,An' de croupier say, "Bettre luck nex' time, dare is good luck an' bad luck in store."
And de wheel she was turn on de peevot and shine in de light electrique,She seem like beeg star to be turning, an' sing tune like she doan care notting;But she turn like de pool on de river dat's tak' everyt'ing down pooty queek,An' she shine like de snake w'en he's body is roll' up—de snake wit' de sting.
An' a'm play teel a lose all dat monee, an' de wicked roulette she go roun',An' a'm play also feefty more dollar, an' ma head she commence for to reel;An' oh, M'sieu, de hard time dat was follow teel a lay ma good wife in de groun',An' hoffen a hask me forgiveness, as dare by dat grave a go kneel.
TIM O'GALLAGHER.
My name is Tim O'Gallagher,—there's Oirish in that same;My parients from the Imerald Oisle beyant the ocean came;My father came from Donegal, my mother came from Clare;But oi was born in Pontiac, besoide the Belle Rivière.Oi spint my choildhood tamin' bears, and fellin' timber trays,And catchin' salmon tin fate long—and doin' what oi plaze.Oi got my iddication from the Riverind Father Blake;He taught me Latin grammar, and he after taught me Grake,Till oi could rade the classics in a distint sort of way—'Twas the sadetoime of the harvist that oi'm rapin' ivery day.
My parients thought me monsthrous shmart—of thim 'twas awful koind,And where oi'd go to college now was what perplixed their moind;So they axed the Riverind Father Blake what varsity was bistTo make a docthor, bachelor and lawyer and the rist.Said Father Blake, "If oi must make decision, faith! oi will:Sure, sind the boy to Munthreal, there's none loike Ould McGill."
So oi came to Munthreal and found McGill one afternoon,And saw a great excoited crowd all shoutin' out of tune;And in the cintre thorty min was foightin' jist loike mad,And two big fellows on the top of one poor little lad.Oi turned indignant to the crowd, and tould them to their face:"Ye pack of coward savages, onciviloized and base,To stand and see two stalwart min abusin' one that way!Oi loike a gladiatorial show, but loike to see fair play."So oi jumped at those two bullies and oi caught thim by the shirt,And oi knocked their hids together and consoigned thim to the dirt.Oi was removed and they were carried home, but all the same,Though Ould McGill was two min short, she won that football game.They thought oi was a tough gussoon, and whin they played agin,They put me in the scrimmage—we got thorty-foive to tin.
Oi thin wint up to college whin the lictures would begin;Oi attinded ivery licture—when oi happened to be in;Got my work up, kipt my note-books in the illigantist shape;Oi took notes of ivery licture—barrin' whin oi was ashlape.But, och! oi try to do my bist, for sure it's Father BlakeAs says the foinist faculty is Arts, and no mistake;For there they tache philosophy and English literature,The mathematics also, and the classic authors, sure.Oi larned the Gracian poethry, oi larned the Latin prose;Oi know as much about thim both as my profissor knows:How Troy, that had for noine long years defoied the Graycian force,Was "hors de combat" put at last by jist a wooden horse;How Xerxes wipt because his army soon would pass away,And Alexander wipt because there were no more to shlay;How Cato from his toga plucked the Carthaginian fruit;How Brutus murdered Saysar, and how Saysar called him "Brute."
Oi'd the honor of a mornin' with an influential Med,And he took me to the room in which they mutilate the dead.Oi don't objict to crack a skull or spoil a purty face,But to hack a man who's dead is what oi called extramely base.But all pursonal convictions, he explained, should be resoignedFor the binifit of scoience and the good of humankoind;And though oi don't at all admoire their ways o' goin' on,Oi'll take a course in Medicine, oi will, before oi'm gone.
Oi saw the Scoience workshops, too, and thought whin oi was made,These little hands were niver mint to larn the blacksmith trade;And for that illictricity, the thing what gives the shock,They collared old Promaytheus and chained him to a rockFor a-playin' with the loightnin' and a-raychin to the skoies,And the vultures gnawed his vittles, and the crows picked out his oyes.But toimes has changed, and larnin' gives us power—don't you see?—And whin oi'm done with Arts oi'll take that shplindid faculty;For, sure, it's from their workshops that the solar system's run;Besoides, they make the wither, too, and rigilate the sun.
Oi troied exams at Christmas, and oi didn't pass at all;But oi can have another whack at thim nixt spring and fall.In toime oi'll pass in iverything, and masther all they taiche;Oi'll go through ivery faculty, and come out hid in aiche.And whin oi've conquered all, loike Alexander oi will soighThere is no more to conquer, and oi'll lay me down and doie.They'll birry me with honors, and erict in my behalfA monimint which shall disphlay the followin' epitaph:
"Here loies shwate Tim O'Gallagher,—sure he had wits to shpare,—His father came from Donegal, his mother came from Clare.He was a shplindid scholar, for he studied at McGill;He drank the well of larnin' dhroy (and, faith! he got his fill).Was niver mortal craythur larned to such a great degree,—B.A.M.A.M.D.C.M.B.SC.LL.D."